Blood As My Ink

Imagination

There was a time when I believed

The sky was wider

Than even the most eloquent pen.

The clouds sailed farther than the greatest

White curtains, the stars never dimmed -

Only went to sleep under the sun's blanket.

I believed an albatross

Could hang around and like a bard

Ring out a tale older than winds.

That black cats sent shivers down your eyes

Because they'd seen the truth

Between ladders, and are kind enough to share.

There was a time

Called apathy,

And it was made from the dreams

Some would rather forget,

And others turn cheek and rebuke.

When I believed

In something beyond the eyelid,

When I called out

Demanding the skies

Open further,

I could dream of what it would

Be like to bleed just a little too much,

To feel a kind of cold,

Because some days it was just too hard

To know something like warmth,

The shadows behind curtains.

The arbors under trees and bushes and pretty

Flowers I could crawl beneath

Have wilted, collapsed, concaved

To the point that now

When I find a speck of warm clouded sun

Left behind,

I tuck it deep within myself,

And I save it for the days

When I want so hard to believe

My blood could become some kind of ink,

Some method or power or gift or curse or even

Some kind of excuse to believe

That one day I could pretend,

And it could simply be true.